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THE ABOLITION CRUSADE
AND ITS CONSEQUENCES
FOUR PERIODS OF AMERICAN HISTORY
BY
HILARY A. HERBERT, LL.D.
NEW YORK
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
1912
Copyright, 1912, by
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
Published April, 1912
TO MY GRANDCHILDREN
THIS LITTLE BOOK IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATEDIN THE HOPE THAT ITS PERUSALWILL FOSTER IN THEM, AS CITIZENS OF THIS GREATREPUBLIC, A DUE REGARD FOR THE CONSTITUTIONOF THEIR COUNTRYAS THE SUPREME LAW OF THE LAND
PREFATORY NOTE
BY JAMES FORD RHODES
"Livy extolled Pompey in such a panegyricthat Augustus called him Pompeian,and yet this was no obstacle to theirfriendship." That we find in Tacitus. Wemay therefore picture to ourselves Augustusreading Livy's "History of the CivilWars" (in which the historian's republicansympathies were freely expressed), andlearning therefrom that there were twosides to the strife which rent Rome. Aswe are more than forty-six years distantfrom our own Civil War, is it not incumbenton Northerners to endeavor to seethe Southern side? We may be certainthat the historian a hundred years hence,when he contemplates the lining-up of fiveand one-half million people against twenty-twomillions, their equal in religion, morals,[viii]regard for law, and devotion to the commonConstitution, will, as matter of course, averthat the question over which they foughtfor four years had two sides; that all theright was not on one side and all the wrongon the other. The North should welcome,therefore, accounts of the conflict writtenby candid Southern men.
Mr. Herbert, reared and educated in theSouth, believing in the moral and economicalright of slavery, served as a Confederatesoldier during the war, but after Appomattox,when thirty-one years old, he toldhis father he had arrived at the convictionthat slavery was wrong. Twelve yearslater, when home-rule was completely restoredto the South (1877), he went intopublic life as a Member of Congress, sittingin the House for sixteen years. At the endof his last term, in 1893, he was appointedSecretary of the Navy by President Cleveland,whom he faithfully served during hissecond administration.
[ix]Such an experience is an excellent trainingfor the treatment of any aspect of theCivil War. Mr. Herbert's devotion to theConstitution, the Union,